Sorry its been so long since I last posted- Been busy with other things and some how the blog got left out for a wee while.
Autumn calving has started here, and the weather's finally turned. Personally I'm loving that the sun is no longer quite as strong (but, being near the hole in the O-zone layer its always very strong) and that we've finally started getting a bit of rain. Still not quite enough to get everything growing fully, but we're getting there. This all, of course, with the back drop of you in the northern hemisphere finally making it out of winter, the days getting lighter and warmer, lambs and calves being born and things starting to grow again.
Some of you may know that I've hit 2 bits of bother in the last few weeks. One was a stomach bug after too much running around being busy. Everyone was very helpful and it just took me a little while to get back to normal. At first I thought it was sun stroke, then my flat mates got it, in a lesser form. Woops. Practice manager was glad it wasn't from the barbecue he cooked us the day before.
I also managed to cut my leg open! :) With my new hoof knife, no less. Some idiot decided he'd check out a slow lame cow's feet in the middle of a field, fell over, and cut through overalls, skin, and into the adipose of my thigh. The old ones wouldn't have made it through the overalls. Anyway, I bandaged myself up and got to experience the NZ NHS AKA ACC- basically its like the NHS, but just covers for accidents & the like, though one still has to pay a small amount. Seems like a pretty good system to me. Yes, I could have sutured myself, but I wanted a Tetanus jab and antibiotics too, so thought I'd do it properly. If you want to see the pictures they're on my Facebook page- won't stick them up here, I know some people don't like blood etc. But all good now.
Anyway, a few weekends ago I had a 3 day weekend, so decided, having gone North and South, to venture West.
To the West of Bulls one travels through the town of Wanganui- which has a reputation similar to Castleford. But this is NZ, so its got no areas as bad a Cas' bad bits, and it has a massive outdoor pursuits tourist attraction! The Whanganui River (Wh is an F in Maori, but some people say this one is pronounced as a W.) ends here, and up stream people go kayaking, canoeing, fishing, boating, etc. I'll hopefully go up here some other time though.
The real attraction of going West is the region of Taranaki, dominated by Mount Egmont- a lonely volcano. The forests here are stunted compared to the rest of NZ, perhaps due to the altitude, perhaps due to the rocky terrain. It is, however, very pleasant, not for size but in myriad quaint settings. There's a(nother) Middle-Earth/ Hobbit set round every corner.
The Volcano, on the other hand, is huge. The peak is sacred, so despite all the mountaineers who climb it, one is not supposed to stand on the summit. Europeans called the Mountain Mount Egmont, but originally the Maori named him Taranaki- the lonely volcano man who's head was the summit. Hence by standing on the summit one is standing on the top of the region's protector, which is disrespectful.
The Mountain is generally wreathed in clouds, and has its own weather systems. When Captain James Cook came to Taranaki he stayed in the region for a month and never saw the top of the mountain. There's a story that the first surveyor of New Plymouth, Taranaki's main settlement, never even mentioned the Mountain in his notes. It's a challenging mountain to climb due to the variability of the weather and is not something I would advise people to do. Though that doesn't stop me from wanting to do it one day.
It's a cool place with a bit of the forest, water & volcanic features of NZ, but I'd say there are better places to see each separately. This doesn't stop the drive up to the Dawson Falls car park worth doing There's a great walking circuit through the various types of forest and rock formations- it does, however, contain a lot of "bridges"...
[LINK TO YOUTUBE BRIDGE VIDEOS]
There will be more of these... http://youtu.be/eLywXfLWvqM
I also found some interesting new wild life whilst I was there- including a weird spider!
[LINK TO YOUTUBE SPIDER VIDEOS]
After all of this, plus a quite cold night camping in the car park, I eventually went down to Dawson Falls:
[LINK TO YOUTUBE DAWSON FALLS VIDEOS]
I mustn't forget the human stuff up on the mountain side too!
NZ has a rich history of tourism (how? Its SO far away and people had to get a ship here. Yeh, but its got lots of amazing stuff, so people came to see it.) One part of this tourism is Dawson Falls, which people have been visiting for over a centuary. This was also one of the base camps for attempting the summit- there's a hut part way up as a way station/ 2nd base camp/ safety point. Its not the preeminent route, but it remains significant. Hence the Department of Conservation has an office here, with a small shop and museum, and there's a small B&B plus a few huts. Makes a nice place to stop at.
In the past this place was also powered by a hydroelectric generator, that's still working! As someone who went to a lot of steam rallies as a kid this is fascinating to me.
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